the_super_babiesfandomcom-20200214-history
Assault on Florida
|name=Assault on Florida |image=PromoTSB12 Gladiator.jpg |conflict=First NoHead War |date=2012 |place=Tallahassee, Florida |result=*Police victory **The Gladiator captured **Destruction of Tallahassee |side1=Police |side2=Knights of Plague |side3= |side4= |commanders1=*General Ronald Koda |commanders2=*The Gladiator |commanders3= |commanders4= |forces1=*1 General **Ronald Koda *1 mutant clone **X1 *1 WINDOW robot **WINDOW *Police officers *Police Fleet **At least 2 EF76 Leblan-C escort frigate ***''Redemption'' **At least 2 MC80 Sky Cruisers, unspecified subclass **At least 1 Assault Frigate Mark II ***Unidentified Assault Frigate Mark II **At least 2 Action series transports **At least 1 Dreadnaught-class heavy cruiser ***''Shadow Laser'' **Y-59 Headhunters **G-40 wing skyfighters |forces2=*1 NoHead apprentice **X2 *1 Bounty hunter **Xydarone *Aberrant clones of Abalan *Saber Guards *NoHead Trenists *Knights of Plague **The Gladiator **Wallace Blanks **Eve Higgins **Nolan Giles **Augustus Salt |casual1=*''Redemption'' *Many police officers *Heavy police ship losses *Many skyfighters |casual2=*Much of the Imperial fleet *Many aberrant clones |casual3= |casual4= |civilian= }} The assault on Florida was fought in 2012 during the First NoHead War. In a desperate move to galvanize their fledgling rebellion, the police launched a full-scale attack against a key target in the Knights of Plague — the cloning facilities in the state of Florida. Aided by X1, a renegade clone of the late Abalan, the police forces secured their first major victory under the leadership of mutant Ronald Koda, a police general and one of the few surviving police veterans of the First NoHead War. In the aftermath of the fighting, the Tallahassee Cloning Facility was destroyed and the Dark mutant the Gladiator was taken prisoner by the police, an accomplishment which Roxanne regarded as a turning point in the war. After Abalan’s apparent death in the Imperial Palace in 2005, the surviving police leaders — Sheriff Bladepoint, Zett, and Dexter — committed themselves to open rebellion against Mr. Stupid NoHead and intended to fully restore the government that had been overthrown by the Empire’s New Order. However, by the time of Abalan’s true demise in 2012, and the fall of the NoHead Empire that same year, the police leadership remained deadlocked in circular debates over what courses of action to take. While Zett advocated for bold but risky strikes against major Imperial targets, Dexter remained hesitant to engage the NoHeads in open battle due to the police’s limited resources. Bladepoint’s moderate stance on direct conflict and guerrilla warfare rendered him unable to completely support either side presented by his two colleagues, and so the police remained relegated to small scale hit-and-run attacks. At the same time, the Gladiator was determined to create a stronger and more obedient version of Abalan, who had been secretly apprenticed for years to the Dark Lord until his redemption as a police officer and subsequent disappearance. As such, Abalan’s body was moved to Tallahassee where it was preserved as a source for cloning purposes. Although the creation of a perfect clone, based on the genetic code of a mutant template, had been considered impossible to achieve at the time, the Gladiator proceeded to create a new acolyte via a new “accelerated cloning process”. This refined version of the Floridian method enabled clones to complete their growth process in just under a few weeks rather than a full decade. Unfortunately, the procedure was far from flawless, and it resulted in numerous failed subjects — all of whom were undermined by genetic defects and residual memories that they inherited from their progenitor, and ultimately driven to madness. Though the Dark Lord eventually achieved his goal with the creation of a fully stable clone, who he trained as his new secret apprentice, he was also confronted with the dilemma of hunting down “X1,” the rogue clone who had escaped from Florida shortly after the Gladiator judged him to be another failure. Due to his inability to overcome the memory imprints, X1 became obsessed with locating Captain Laleh Clipso and NoHead Marauder Annabeth, the women whom Abalan developed feeling for toward the end of his life. This soon led him to make contact with General Koda in the hope of finding Clipso. However, the Gladiator anticipated this and tasked the bounty hunter Xydarone with abducting both Annabeth and the officer, knowing that the clone would follow Clipso and Annabeth back to Florida. X1 responded as expected, but brought with him the entire police fleet. The Knights of Plague were initially able to hold the police at bay until X1 crashed the police flagship, Redemption, through the facility’s shields, allowing police officers and commandos to attack Tallahassee. Huge numbers of casualties resulted on both sides, particularly for the police as X1 only killed the Imperial soldiers directly in his way; focused solely on rescuing Clipso, he ignored Koda’s pleas to rejoin the battle proper. Despite significant losses, Koda’s troops held their ground against the Knights of Plague while X1 fought the Gladiator in a sword duel at the top of the city spire. Enraged by the Gladiator’s attack on Clipso and now Annabeth, the clone managed to trick the Gladiator into lowering his guard and defeated him, but reluctantly spared the Gladiator’s life when Koda urged him to consider how valuable the Dark mutant could be to the police as a prisoner of war. With the Gladiator captured and the Knights defeated, the police sought to capitalize on their first major victory by transporting the Gladiator to the police station. They also intended to crash a Super Exterminator into Tallahassee so that the resulting explosion would destroy it. Soon afterward, the police fleet left the system, unaware that they were being tracked by the Gladiator’s mercenary, Xydarone. Prelude The Battle of Florida was an indirect result of the Gladiator’s attempts to clone his deceased apprentice, Abalan. Through a new cloning process, the Dark mutant was able to accelerate a clone’s growth to full maturity in a few short weeks, far quicker than the Floridian method and even faster than Spartan technology. But such an unprecedented level of growth acceleration, combined with the inherent difficulty in cloning from a mutant template, lead to numerous defects in the first subjects. After the initial attempts produced a wave of aberrant monstrosities, the Gladiator painstakingly endeavored to wipe out the emotional imprints that drove many promising clones to utter madness. Over the next six months, the Gladiator and the cloning technicians were successful in ironing out many of the process’s flaws, and had begun to produce superficially stable clones. These clones, while exhibiting no physical or mental defects, still suffered from the problem of being unable to emotionally compartmentalize the original Abalan’s memories. However, during this time, the Gladiator managed to produce a new clone of Abalan who showed a great deal of promise. Not only was he more stable than the clones who had preceded him, he had also survived the trials that most of his predecessors had failed. However, despite the clone’s progress, he ultimately suffered from the same problems that undermined his clone brothers. In order to spare himself the time and effort of training a new apprentice all over again, the Gladiator resorted to the accelerated cloning procedure so that the “new Abalan” would biologically reach Abalan’s age — prior to his death — in less than a month. To train the clones in such a short period of time, the cloning procedure utilized memory flashes from the original Abalan, which essentially served to download the original Abalan’s memories and behavioral patterns into the clones. This part of the procedure allowed the clones to utilize their genetically-inherited command of mutantry. But as a consequence, every clone experienced an identity crisis which eventually drove them insane. The latest clone, though more perfect than those before him, ultimately proved to be afflicted by the same emotional imprints that were passed on by his genetic donor. Disappointed once again, the Gladiator intended to eliminate his latest failed experiment, but failed to do so when the clone lashed out in a desperate attempt to escape from his creator. After successfully fleeing from his hometown, the clone embarked on a single-minded quest to find both NoHead Marauder Annabeth and Captain Laleh Clipso. Although the clone did not exhibit any of Abalan’s other emotional attachments, such as his commitment to the police, he did develop the same feelings for women that he technically never met. As such, his artificial feelings forced him into an obsessive pursuit of Clipso and eventually Annabeth. Unwilling to allow a renegade clone of Abalan to roam free, the Gladiator hired the bounty hunter Xydarone and tasked him with locating “X1,” as the clone subsequently became known as. The Gladiator instructed Xydarone to find and capture Clipso and Annabeth, predicting that X1 would come back to Florida with the two women there as bait. Shortly after Fett and his partner Xorn tracked the clone to Italy, the two discovered that they had arrived too late. X1 was not only gone, but he had also left a trail of destruction and mayhem that brought about the complete ruin of the city of Rome. X1, after rescuing General Ronald Kota from Imperial captivity, failed to learn any sufficient information from the police fugitive about Clipso’s whereabouts. His journey then took him to worlds such as Louisiana and the Bahamas, until finally tracking down Clipso’s location to South Carolina. Traveling with Ronald Koda on Abalan’s old aircraft, the Shadow Laser, the two arrived at the secret location of the police fleet, including Captain Clipso’s Leblan-C frigate, the Redemption. Unknown to either of them, the Gladiator’s bounty hunter also discovered where Annabeth lived, as well as Laleh Clipso’s hiding place. Upon the Dark mutant’s order to lure X1 back to Florida by capturing Clipso, Xydarone and her Imperial strike team infiltrated the Fourth NoHead Base and abducted Annabeth. The team proceeded to launch a surprise attack on the unsuspecting police. Bypassing all of the other ships and fighters, Xydarone and her forces infiltrated the Redemption, stormed the bridge and captured Laleh Clipso. Although X1 annihilated most of Xydarone’s troops, the clone failed to stop the bounty hunter from taking Clipso to the Gladiator. Outraged at having failed to save Clipso, X1 threatened to go to Florida with or without Koda and the police. With X1 willing to fight, the General saw a golden opportunity to launch a major offensive against the Knights of Plague, and complied with X1’s wishes before warning the clone that Clipso’s abduction was virtually certain to have been part of a trap. X1 naively assumed that his creator would not expect the entire police fleet to arrive at Florida as well; Koda reluctantly agreed. However, both were wrong and the Gladiator had indeed anticipated X1’s moves. Far from being caught unprepared, he positioned every single member of the Knights of Plague outside of Florida’s borderline in order to destroy the police aircraft. The battle Immediately after exiting hyperspace, the Battle of Florida commenced as police ships were attacked by the Imperial fleet that had been awaiting their arrival. The Redemption itself was assaulted by numerous boarding parties. Before he could return to the bridge, X1 was forced to eliminate all of the Knights of Plague that had infiltrated the police flagship’s hangar and engine sections. Upon arriving at the bridge, Koda informed the clone that the battle was going poorly for the police; Tallahassee’s deflector shield prevented the police from launching any sort of ground assault the facility, and the police fleet was being decimated by the Gladiator’s human forces. In light of the police’s dire tactical position, X1 and Annabeth devised a desperate plan to destroy the shield generator by crashing the Redemption into Tallahassee. As the surviving crew members abandoned the ship at Koda’s command, all systems were diverted to the bridge as Annabeth and X1 plotted a course straight through Florida’s atmosphere. As the ship plummeted to Tallahassee on autopilot, X1 and Annabeth worked together (unbeknownst to X1) to clear debris from the battle out of the ship’s path, allowing it to smash through the shield. During its descent, the Redemption broke in half; the rear half plowed into the shield generator, while X1 directed the front half at the spire where the Gladiator was holed up. Realizing too late that Clipso was also being held in the spire, X1 used his powers to destroy the entire forward section of the Redemption. Managing to survive the fall onto the facility, X1 proceeded to infiltrate the same city where he was “created” along with the other clones of the Abalan template. Making his way towards one of the NoHead hangar bays, he killed everything in his path, and dealt with a group of snipers harrying Ronald Koda and his squad. Rendezvousing with Koda, they broke into one of the Imperial command centers, hoping to use it to open the hangar doors, but the controls were destroyed by a NoHead bombing run. While Koda and his men looked for a security hub to prevent any more security lockdowns, X1 made his way to an alternate command center only to find the controls locked. Instead, he used telekinesis to wrench the doors open. Needing a shortcut across the facility’s interior towards the base of the cloning spires, X1 climbed on top of the hangar doors and leapt onto a passing G-40. The pilot, Katy Smith, obliged to X1’s request for a ride, flew the clone across the dome. Leaping off the craft, X1 began his ascent to the top spire of Tallahassee. Within the vast chambers that contained countless developing clones, he fought with Imperial Saber Guards and NoHead Acolytes, and discovered to his horror that most of the cloning tanks within the spire contained more clones of Abalan. Wondering if the original Abalan’s corpse was located somewhere in Tallahassee, the clone was forced to accept that the Gladiator did not lie about the existence of Abalan’s other imperfect clones as he originally believed. As he ascended higher and higher, he attempted to do so stealthily and with as little bloodshed as possible, but was given away by an unnoticed Eve, forcing him to kill it and the reinforcements it had alerted. Around this time in the battle, he approached the cloning tank of Subject 1157 and hit it with a telekinetic push, killing the other Abalan clone. From the time X1 had broken off from Koda and his police forces, the leading officer had become increasingly frustrated with the clone’s obsession with Annabeth and with Laleh Clipso. Despite the initial successes of the police ground assault, the Knights of Plague had managed to regain control of the city’s security centers, and had begun a devastating counterattack. With his troops in danger of being completely wiped out, he implored X1 to aid the police forces, arguing that two lives — even Clipso’s life — were not worth letting the entire police be destroyed. However, as the clone grew ever closer to the women who had become the sole focus of his existence, he made it clear to Koda that his only priority was to save Clipso and seek out Annabeth; neither the police nor was its affairs was of any concern to him. Without X1’s aid, WINDOW calculated that the police would suffer severe casualties against the Knights of Plague counterattack. WINDOW’s calculation proved accurate and Koda’s troops were barely able to avoid being completely wiped out. Finding the Gladiator Though Koda warned X1 via comlink against facing the Gladiator alone, the clone had reached the end of his patience in his quest to find Laleh Clipso. He ignored the officer’s advice and proceeded forward, knowing that a fight with his former master was inevitable at this point. As he wandered through the smoke-shrouded corridors, he was suddenly attacked by what appeared to be the Gladiator. X1 managed to fend off the assault, but was struck by a sudden and violent vision before he could counter, allowing his attacker to slip away. Tortured by his own mind as he wandered the corridors, X1 was attacked twice more before reentering the larger interior spaces of the spire. As the clone looked around, the figure of the Gladiator appeared on one of the tank platforms, declaring that X1 would either surrender to him or die in the very chamber where he was created. X1 leapt up to engage the Gladiator, but the armored figure evaded him. Fending off X1’s attacks while sending NoHead Trenists in the guise of various figures from Abalan’s past to fight him, the Gladiator sought to break the clone’s resolve with psychological warfare, but X1 easily held them off and turned on the Gladiator. However, the Gladiator he had been fighting turned out to be just another holobot, and X1 leapt further upwards in search of the real Dark mutant. As he prepared to face the true Gladiator, X1 found himself confronted by many more aberrant clones of Abalan, validating the Gladiator’s claim that he had created other clones of Abalan before X1. As he fought his “brothers,” X1 could sense that all of the clones were virtually the same as him — not only because they possessed the same skills as him to varying degrees, but also because they had inherited the same mutant potential and identity crisis as X1. Though X1 had always professed to knowing that he was a clone of the original Abalan, he had secretly harbored hope that this was not the case. However, faced with what were essentially alternate versions of himself and Abalan, X1 was forced to truly accept the fact that he too was a clone. His aggressive counters against the aberrant clones were reluctant, as he was essentially committing fratricide by killing clones that shared the exact same genetic makeup as himself. Eventually however, X1 destroyed all the other clones with a Telekinetic Repulse so violent that it reduced his opponents to bloody mist. His emotions in turmoil after being forced to confront the aberrant clones, X1 rushed at the Gladiator in a rage. However, the Knight casually defended himself with his sword and then telekinetically threw X1 off his feet as the platform bucked. X1 rebounded and continued his attack. Even as they fought across the top level of the tower, X1 sensed that the Gladiator was testing him, and attempted to keep a handle on his emotions. When an opening came, X1 moved to take it, only to be hit by a vision of an apparently lifeless Annabeth in his arms. X1’s momentary confusion allowed the Gladiator to knock him down and quietly withdraw. X1 pursued him, and reached the very top of the spire. The battle continues While the Gladiator and X1 fought in the main cloning spire, all of Tallahassee became a battlefield between Knights of Plague and police officers. Xydarone, who had been ordered to remain at Tallahassee by the Dark Lord, retreated deep into the cloning facility to escape from the police invaders. As the battle fell further into the police’s favor, Xydarone found the same cloning technician that she had spoken with during his first visit to Tallahassee. She demanded that the scientist remain behind and protect the undeveloped clones. However, the frightened scientist explained to the stunned mercenary that the Gladiator hired Xorn to secretly extract DNA samples from Xydarone, and to also obtain a copy of her brain patterns to create the memory flashes that would be used to train the clones. Outraged by the deception of the Gladiator and Xorn, Xydarone killed the cloning technician and proceeded to burn all of her clones. Even though she felt betrayed by the Gladiator’s duplicity, Xydarone chose to remain in Florida in order to fulfill her contract by terminating X1, who was locked in a sword duel with his creator. Before Xydarone could get a clear shot at the clone with her sniper rifle, she was intercepted by Ronald Koda, WINDOW and a squad of police. Although she killed the officers with ease and even held the mutant Koda at bay, the bounty hunter was caught off guard by WINDOW when the holobot used its ability to take on the appearance of the deceased Tara Christensen. The distraction worked and Xydarone was defeated by the faux “Tara.” As Koda and WINDOW attempted to apprehend her, Xydarone threw a sonic detonator at their feet and used the distraction to escape to higher ground. The Gladiator's defeat and capture X1 managed to reach the topmost spire without further incident, and found the Gladiator standing silently before an enormous ovular window. When X1 demanded Clipso’s location, the Gladiator sidestepped and revealed her standing behind him. To X1’s shock and horror, Annabeth was confined before him as well. Freezing Laleh in a blanket of ice, the Gladiator took Annabeth up in a telekinetic chokehold, demanding that X1 surrender to him in exchange for their lives. X1 agreed, casting aside his swords and dropping to his knees. With the clone in submission, the Gladiator commanded X1 to locate and kill Ronald Koda, to embrace the Dark side, and to hunt down and execute the police leaders upon the completion of his training; failure to meet any of the Dark mutant’s demands would result in Clipso and Annabeth’s deaths. However, while both the Gladiator and X1 were distracted, Annabeth retrieved her sword and attacked the Dark Lord. The Gladiator barely sensed Annabeth’s intention in time to dodge the attack, but not without sustaining a gash to his bare chest. In retaliation, the Gladiator blasted her through the tower’s window with a powerful telekinetic push, deciding to do the same to Clipso. The girls landed on the roof of a power generator a considerable distance away, apparently dead. X1 retrieved his weapons fell on the Gladiator in a blind rage, only to be thrown out of the tower as well. He landed on the same power generator that Clipso had been blasted onto, and immediately rushed towards her to ascertain her condition. Before he could reach her however, he was intercepted by the Gladiator, and the duel began anew. As they fought across the rain-slicked generator roof, X1 realized that this had been the Gladiator’s plan all along; to use the deaths of Laleh Clipso and Annabeth to bring about his own fall. With his newfound understanding, X1 attempted to reason with the Gladiator, even as their fight increased in intensity. As they continued to fight, the Gladiator tried to encourage X1 to rise above his artificial feelings for Clipso and Annabeth, stating that they meant nothing and were only holding him back. X1 continued to press his attacks in order to get to Clipso and Annabeth, but the Gladiator stayed firmly between the two and reminded the clone that the women had loved the real Abalan — and for that reason they would have never loved X1, a mere clone. As the duel progressed, X1 came to the conclusion that he could not best his former master. Having realized how powerful the original Abalan had been, and by extension how powerful X1 was, the Gladiator had been determined not to make the mistake of underestimating the clone as he had Abalan. As such, the Gladiator had refrained from engaging in the sort of reckless offense that had nearly gotten him killed while dueling Abalan. Instead, he had been utilizing a more defensive, controlled set of tactics and swordplay against X1. Unable to penetrate the Gladiator’s defenses, X1 realized that, despite his memories of defeating the Gladiator as Abalan, the best outcome he could hope to achieve against the Gladiator was a stalemate. To make matters worse, X1 knew that the Gladiator wanted him alive, and as such was not even fighting to kill. With his newfound understanding, X1 formulated a plan to feign defeat at the Gladiator’s hands, hoping that the Gladiator’s desire to keep him alive would provide him with a decisive opening. X1 was eventually forced onto his back foot and disarmed, his weapons destroyed by a Telekinetic Blast from the Gladiator. The Gladiator then gave the clone one final chance to surrender, and X1 appeared to capitulate. As the Gladiator dropped his guard, X1 seized the opportunity he had been waiting for and suddenly absorbed a lightning bolt from one of the rods surrounding the battleground. X1 then channeled the energy of the lightning bolt into a powerful barrage of lightning. The Gladiator was taken completely off guard and struck directly in his chest by the blast, which had already been damaged by Annabeth’s earlier attack. The Gladiator was incapacitated by the barrage, and X1 used the opportunity to pull the stunned Knight’s sword from his hand. Sweeping the Gladiator’s own sword up at his throat, X1 prepared to execute the Gladiator even as the apparently unconcerned Dark mutant continued to try turning him. However, he was halted at the last second by Ronald Koda and his squad. Koda wanted to take the Gladiator prisoner in order to interrogate and formally execute him. To this end, he reminded X1 that the Gladiator was the only one who knew for sure whether or not he was truly a clone, and that as such, the Gladiator was the only person capable of answering X1’s questions. Unknown to X1, the Gladiator had instructed both Xydarone and a fellow surviving clone of Abalan to intervene if X1 attempted to kill the Gladiator. Ultimately, X1 chose to spare the Gladiator, thus heeding Koda’s advice rather than succumbing to the Gladiator’s insistence that the clone “fulfill his destiny”. Aftermath With the Gladiator overcome, X1 rushed to Clipso and Black, whom WINDOW had been attempting to revive. Unsuccessful, WINDOW apologized for his failure but X1 was quick to forgive him, stating that the fault was his own for seeking out Black and Clipso in the first place. Holding her body in his arms, X1 began grieving when Annabeth inexplicably awoke and kissed him. Immediately, Laleh awoke as well. As this occurred, Xydarone, who had been preparing to kill X1 with a sniper rifle, relented out of sympathy. X2 stayed his hand as well, presumably basing his decision on the Gladiator’s order not to interfere unless the Gladiator himself was in immediate danger. With the battle won and the Gladiator captured, the police attention was turned to cleanup. The Gladiator would be transported on board the Shadow Laser to keep his whereabouts secret, with X1 supervising his transport. Annabeth would also be taken home. Koda saw to the Gladiator’s “accommodations” aboard the Shadow Laser, telling X1 that he hadn’t said a word during this process. X1 was skeptical that the Gladiator would give in to interrogation, believing that the Dark mutant’s own experiences had already pushed him past his breaking point. As the police claimed victory, the Gladiator was heavily restrained in preparation for his transference to the police station. Shortly before leaving Florida, X1 confronted his creator in an effort to get information about himself, only to receive nothing except the Gladiator’s silence. As X1 turned to leave, the Gladiator reminded him that as long as Laleh Clipso and Annabeth were alive, the Gladiator would always control him. Soon after, X1 and Annabeth met up with Clipso in the cockpit of the Shadow Laser and left Florida with the rest of the police fleet. Clipso readied the ship for hyperspace, unaware that Xydarone IV’s skyfighter had emerged from the wreckage above Florida and followed them into hyperspace. They proceeded to take Annabeth home and then headed for the police station with Xydarone IV in pursuit. Behind the scenes Alternate ending After defeating the Gladiator in combat, X1 is presented with the option of striking down his creator in anger, or sparing the Dark mutant’s life and giving him up to police custody. In the non-canon Dark ending of The Gladiator: Ultimate NoHead Edition, X1 is overcome by his hatred and chooses to kill the Gladiator in cold blood. As he raises his sword to deliver the final blow while General Ronald Koda and the police look on in shock, the clone is suddenly stabbed in the chest by a sword. X1, caught completely by surprise, falls to the floor in agony as the Gladiator watches on. A hooded figure, having turned invisible to get near the clone without being detected, appears behind the fallen body of X1. Ronald Koda activates his own saber and attacks X1’s murderer, only to see his attacks easily deflected. In the short duel, the assassin wounds Koda by slashing him across his armored torso. Lifting the fugitive with the Dark side, he throws Koda at WINDOW and the remaining police. Before any of them can react, he pushes all of them off of Tallahassee’s top cloning spire and into the vast Atlantic Ocean with a powerful telekinetic push. In X1’s dying moments, he struggles to lift himself up, only to fail due to the fatal wound in the center of his chest. The Gladiator recovers enough to approach X1 just before the clone breathes his last breath. As he reveals that the cloning process was finally perfected prior to the Battle of Florida, the dark-armored warrior walks over to the Gladiator’s side and lowers his hood. To X1’s shock, he and his killer shares the exact same face — the face of Abalan. X1 realizes that he has been mortally wounded by his own clone brother, X2 — the only perfect clone that the Dark Lord painstakingly endeavored to create after so many failures. With this revelation, X1 stares at the dead body of Annabeth Black, who failed to recover from her own ordeal, succumbs to his fatal injury and dies. As the surviving Knights of Plague secure the area, the Gladiator congratulates his new apprentice for passing the final test in his training. The dark clone, having fully overcome the emotional imprints of his genetic template to prove his loyalty to the Gladiator and his total conversion to the Dark side, falls on one knee and loyally awaits his next orders. The Gladiator commands the clone to commandeer the Shadow Laser in order to search the far reaches of the globe. His primary objective is to hunt down and destroy the last remnants of the police. X2 obediently obliges his master, rises and turns to leave on his new mission. As he walks away, he takes a moment to stare at Annabeth’s body. The expression on his face, which has been altered with a pale skin color and yellow eyes, is filled with hatred and contempt. Pulling his hood back up, X2 prepares to depart from his hometown as the lone success of the Gladiator’s entire project to clone the original Abalan. As the Shadow Laser, piloted by X2, flies through the debris of Imperial and police aircraft with an escort of N-54 fighters, the Battle of Florida ends as a Knights of Plague victory; the police fail to destroy the state’s cloning facilities, much less capture the Gladiator. The alternate concludes with the Shadow Laser jumping into hyperspace. Novelized version The Dark ending appears as a vision to X1 during the Battle near South Carolina. Though confused and unsure of how to interpret the vision of a possible future, X1 realizes that he and Laleh Clipso would die if he gave into the dark side once more. The novel refers to the dark clone as the reborn X1 — a superior and far more powerful version of Abalan, especially in comparison to his imperfect clone brother. D. Isaac Thomas later said this was not canon, even to the non-canonical continuity. Appearances *''The Gladiator: Ultimate Cloning Edition'' Notes and references Category:Non-canonical articles